


Fight. Wither. Die. Rise.

by Tobiramamara



Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore
Genre: Being Lost, Domestic Disputes, F/M, Lost Love, Love, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-04
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:47:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29848659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tobiramamara/pseuds/Tobiramamara
Summary: It is said in the ancient myths that Hades made Persephone eat a pomegranate kernel to ensure she would return to him in the Underworld. What happens when she spits it out after a domestic dispute?
Relationships: Hades & Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Hades/Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 14





	Fight. Wither. Die. Rise.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ruiniel](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ruiniel/gifts).



> Thank you lovely beta, for checking the story for me on such short notice! 
> 
> Ruiniel, this story is for you, as requested and promised. Hope you enjoy it.

Fight. Wither. Die. Rise. 

Pina pursed her lips, assessing the red millet culms bending downwards over the edge of the pot, succumbing to their own rich weight. The reddish brown of the grain was similar in color to the strands of her hair, but she did not notice. The plant, brimming with life and energy, felt heavy in her hand when she caressed the rugged kernels it harboured. But she seemed cut off from its essence. 

Her life was one on the edge of color, a grey life, stripped of brightness. She felt that she had been brought up by this place of stone, concrete and asphalt as her constant companions. Shallowness, hatred, impatience, misunderstanding, ignorance. All were cast at her and she had swallowed them all, their remnants clinging to her. 

It felt wrong, this life. She had felt something more, deep inside her. There was a spark, but she had no way to nurture it, nowhere to put it where it would grow. She needed a key to unlock herself, but the tools to forge one she had not. It was an odd notion but felt true to her. It was also a depressing one. Pina felt herself dragged down, further into a grey nothingness, until even that precious spark would be lost to her. 

She stood within the four grey walls of the small enclosed patio of her apartment. The last ray of sunlight was leaving the ground and would not return until spring. She felt it in her very being... the turning of the wheel of life. Autumn was here. And she would not see winter, nor spring. She would end this, before the spark inside her would be dead and gone. 

In the small kitchen she drank her now cold coffee, put on a coat and left her apartment, making sure the cup was in the sink with water in it to avoid a stain. She closed the door behind her and it fell into the lock with a definite soft click for the last time. It made her feel a deep sense of closure and relief. 

Xxxxxxxx

She walked in between the graffiti sprayed train carriages scattered on the rough terrain. Her feet bare, her shoes discarded some miles ago, her toes sought out softness desperately, but met only hars angles. She knew the place. The location where the harsh metal tracks cut through the brown pebbles. It would be as good a place as any to end this. To save being a witness to that last remnant of light inside her from simply fading. It would be unbearable to witness.

The stones felt cold, the air crisp. Then the glint of sunlight on metal in the distance. Finally. 

She stepped into the cleared path of the railroad track that lay like a sharp mathematical line, calculated, cold. She approached with a steady pace until she stood inches from it. Swallowing, she lifted her right foot and placed it on the track. When the cold metal surprised her skin a deep voice slithered behind her. It was a voice made of velvet, deep and penetrating, yet airy and fleeting. She turned. 

A man stood behind her, just within the shadows of one carriage, its windows like black empty sockets. He was dressed in black, his face pale. His feet were bare, just like hers, his hair long and straight and dark. His eyes like onyx. 

“You are lost.” It was no question. 

She frowned. “I think not.” 

He stepped closer. The blackness of him seemed to fade within the sunlight. His onyx eyes glinted. She watched his approach like a deer caught in headlights, unable to move. When he stood inches from her and his coldness penetrated her dress, she looked up at him with a frown. 

“As much as I long for bone, rotting flesh and lost souls, yours I loath to see in my realm thus. You know this is not the way.” 

She shrunk at his words, refusing to decipher his true meaning and focused on one detail. “How can you claim to love rotting flesh?”

He scrutinized her carefully. Then softly, almost longingly it seemed to her, he spoke: “You… you of all the divine. You have always understood.” He sighed. “You are lost.”

Mesmerized at this odd conversation, she stared at him for some time. He knew what she was about to do, yet he did not shun the truth. It lay between them like an open wound, vulnerable and raw. 

“What have I always understood?”

“That there will be no life without death.”

This truth sank in and she took a step back, farther on the tracks. 

Let him have his victory, she would be free soon. “You are right in that. Now let me be.”

His eyes narrowed. “This is not the way.”

“Life through death! Your own words!”

“No!” His voice boomed, its echo ricocheting from the metal contraptions around them. He seemed to grow larger, threatening. She took another step backwards until the heels of her feet hit the cold metal of the second rail. 

His voice softened immediately, a resigned quality seeped through it. “You have forgotten all that you are.” 

She stared at him while his velvet voice slithered over her, making her shiver. His words puzzled her. “Who are you?” Suspicion colored her voice. 

For a moment, she imagined hurt flitting through the blackness of his eyes. Then it was gone. 

“I will aid you in retrieving these memories. But you need to step off those tracks and come to me.” He reached his hand towards her in an inviting gesture. 

Something stubborn stirred in her, something unforgiving and stern, and she put one foot on the cold metal behind her. “Why should I? You have nothing to offer me. I am beyond help.” 

The man sighed. “Because I would mourn your passing to my realm if you so chose it.” 

She frowned in suspicion. “Are you crazy?” 

He smiled without mirth. “No. Merely the god of death.” His ominous words clung to her, itching her brain, stirring something in her heart. 

He took a hesitant step towards her, reaching. At the same time, she felt the metal vibrate underneath her foot and a soft screeching in the far distance, promising release and freedom. She stared to the left but did not see the train yet. 

She turned towards the man one last time. “I am made of death. I have a spark inside me and I cannot bear watching it fade.” 

She saw it in his eyes truly now...a deep sadness and longing and beneath that, understanding. He stepped on the railroad track with her, staring down at her. 

His gaze held her mesmerized. How persistent he was, this stranger. A stranger and yet familiar. He felt so familiar. 

“Let me bring forth life in you.”

The loud screeching was closer now and they both whipped their head to the left. He grabbed her hands suddenly. The gesture tender, the soft skin of his fingers caressing her knuckles. 

His voice grew more urgent, “Let me….” But he could not finish, for she shook her head and suddenly emotion poured out of her. Involuntary and forceful. She clawed at the fabric at her chest in agony and cried out loud: “You don’t understand! I feel dead inside! Dead!” 

He closed his eyes for a moment, head tilted backwards. When he opened them, his gaze was kind and vulnerable. He smiled. “No. I am Death. You. Are life... Persephone… “ 

At the sound of that name, something clicked in her brain. And it felt as if some invisible power was poured into her, filling her with memories. The images were vague at first, then more clear, but without meaning. Gardens she saw, green and lush, harvests more rich than she could ever imagine. But also wisps of whiteness, souls, darkness, emptiness, black eyes, white hands, a warm love from a cold body. Gasping, she stared at him in shock. 

The train sped towards them with such velocity that she thought they would be too late. But then, like magic, they stood next to the tracks, the replacement of air from the train pulling at her dress and hair, whipping them about. And then silence. The train had passed like a bad dream. 

She sank to her knees before him, crying out all emotions that he invoked. They poured out of her with force and she was helplessly succumbing to the pace of it. And like that she felt all the remnants of shallowness, hatred, impatience, misunderstanding and ignorance leave her, until there was nothing left to discard. 

And when the man knelt before her, his onyx eyes searching, she felt like an empty shell, devoid of all she ever was. She stared into the black depth of his eyes and saw her reflection and knew then she was not empty. There was the spark, victorious, its light warming her. 

Whatever he saw in her eyes made his lips part in a slow grin, the whiteness of his teeth stood out against the blackness of him. He spoke one word and it marked a new beginning. She did not doubt that. 

“Come.”

With a dizzy making motion, they stood within the small concrete patio of her house. But she shook her head in denial, pushing at his chest. She begged him weakly, “No, please! I died here, take me away from this place!”

He breathed in deeply a small smile curling the corners of his mouth. “Yes… I can feel death here.” 

“You enjoy it?” she asked incredulously. 

“Yes. Death is my domain. This place is the reason I found you, it called to me. But then you left.” 

She turned her face away from him, eyes closed, trying not to feel her surroundings. “I cannot bear the feel of death.”

His cold hand reached for her face slowly, then grasped her chin reverently, turning her towards him. The blackness of his eyes made her drown and she disappeared for a fleeting moment. Then the feeling was gone. 

He stroked her cheek with the back of his hand and smiled in understanding. “I can bear it for the both of us, as long as you give me back life…. Persephone…..” And then he kissed her. Cold chapped lips met hers, sending a shiver along her spine. His tongue slipped past her warm lips, dancing with her, torturing her into sweet oblivion. Butterflies erupted in her stomach. A moan escaped her, the echo softly bounding between the bare concrete walls around them. 

His white hand grasped the top of her dress with force; the soft tinkle of buttons falling felt pleasant in her ears. The cold crisp air made her shiver, her nipples hard pebbles. The fabric fell rustling to the ground in a heap. He traced a path with his fingers from her chin over her chest towards her belly over her mount, then softly sliding in between her legs. She gasped, feeling warmth spreading through her abdomen quickly. Her knees buckled. 

Strong cold arms caught her and brought her gently towards the concrete ground. He pushed her down until she lay flat on her back, her soft curves painfully draped over the sharp and unyielding hardness of the concrete slabs beneath her. Coldness seeped within her, paralyzing her, numbing her. She could only stare up to him. 

He sat before her then, already naked, skin like marble and perfect, his member erect and proud. His onyx eyes glinted in anticipation, the soft want in them made her feel weak. He slowly pushed her legs apart, watching her intimate folds part for him, already seeping moisture. He grunted at the mere sight of it. 

His fingers traced her skin then, touching as if she were a precious gem. And each caress was cold as ice, goosebumps following in its wake. The cold was agonizing, almost painful, until the pain breached some boundary and started to morph into heat. A moan escaped her again and his eyes burned. 

His fingers returned to her belly then, hands encompassing round hips, fingers sinking into soft flesh. He pulled her towards him, holding her legs open, exposing her to his gaze, positioning himself. 

“Let us dance this ancient dance of life and death. Let us see about that spark.” She gave him a small shy nod then, not sure what was happening to her, her heart more sure than her body felt. And then he entered her slowly. 

His girth spread her painfully, and she felt herself open, growing weak. He withdrew gently, giving her time to adjust and then penetrated her again slowly with a grunt. She closed her eyes in pleasure. And then, when he picked up speed, each stroke seemed to ignite her body, kickstarting it, and she could feel the spark in her grow slowly but surely. Gasping she stared at the man, met his burning gaze, watched his face firm with concentration. It seemed as if his eyes would burn her to cinders, each stroke igniting her fire even further. 

She started to move with him and he spread her legs wider. His movements still slow, concentrated, precise, hitting her soft spot. The warmth inside her grew. Her inward gaze noticed with amazement the spark that had grown into more. It radiated a warm glow and yet it kept on growing. And with its light and warmth memories came and his name suddenly spilled over her lips like sweet music: “Hades…” 

The god stopped his pace for a moment, closing his eyes while receiving his name, letting out a shuddering breath. He seemed to grow then, the shadows around him lengthening and deepening. The red kernels of millet in the pot fell, the leaves browning, the stems falling lifeless to the ground. His skin grew paler still, transparent, and his bones shone through, his eyes lying deep within his skull. But she was unafraid and stared into their depths without fear but with love. It was how she had come to know him, her husband of old. 

He gave another push and she closed her eyes again in sweet agony. “Say it again,” his velvet voice a cold whisper sliding over her skin. And she gave him what he demanded of her and chanted his name over and over until she remembered him wholly. 

He kept on filling her, his movements forceful, passionate, loving. Each stroke ignited the warmth inside of her further, each stroke caressed her sweet spot, each stroke made her opening up more, until she felt ripe and pliable beneath him, open, ready, warm, longing. She was filled like a cup with golden light and she started to feel full. Full with the promise of life. 

“Persephone… my love…” His words sounded desperate, the emotion in them made tears leak from her eyes. His hands grasped her flesh painfully and the warmth inside her made her finally capable of moving. In her growing passion she held his face in her hands, kissed him back, groped his hair, his back. 

And then, she realised, she could no longer contain the warmth he put inside of her and she took control, grounding herself, feeling the earth beneath the thick layers of concrete. She felt its pulsing life essence and pulled it into her. She became the power itself then, warm, throbbing, a force of nature. She felt it build up, dancing underneath her skin. But it was still not enough. Her hair was glowing as were her eyes when she cast them upon him. 

He trembled underneath her gaze and power, accepting the shift in balance while on the verge of ecstacy. He was standing down, succumbing to her needs and he did so gladly. And she took his offering of servitude, releasing all that she was, then and there, sending herself over the edge. She forced his ecstacy, taking him with her. The god of death surrendered to her will, allowing his seed to be drained from him, used… death to life.. life to death…. And she felt complete. 

xxxxxxxxx

She woke to a green light and a cold caress. A muscular arm was posessively wrapped around her, her curves were met with soft moss and leaves. His scent was familiar, rock, salt, chalk and she sighed deeply. When she opened her eyes, she saw green. The small patio had exploded into a green oasis; bricks, concrete and cement all eroded by roots, the squareness of the space distorted by the invasion of life. 

“Persephone….”

She turned her head to look at him. His onyx eyes filled with moisture. She smiled tenderly at him. He kissed her brow then, maybe to hide the tears that threatened to fall. His whisper in her ear made her falter: “I missed you more than death itself….”

She let his black strands of hair fall through her fingers, twirling a lock around her finger. “I was lost. But you found me.” 

He supported his head on his hand, elbow resting on the grass, while his other hand traced the lines of her face. Then something red, like small ruby, shone in his fingers and her eyes were pulled to it. She smiled knowingly, parting her lips, her tongue wetting them. “Yes, let us not repeat this hardship ever again….”

He mimicked her smile with one of his own, his tongue sliding along the edge of his teeth. “Then don’t spit it out after such a trivial dispute, Kore. You know I was right.”

She stomped his shoulder gently at his words. “You want to start this argument again? I will win this time.” 

He laughed out loud at that, head bent backwards, carefree. When he regained his wits he said fondly, “You are quite something, Kore.. I missed your wit.” 

He stilled and watched her tongue flick out, mesmerized. He then kissed the ruby kernel and slipped it between her lips. Her tongue caught his fingers, sucking sensually, making him moan softly. She showed him the kernel on her tongue, then swallowed and he kissed her with passion, slow and deliberate.

No more words were needed and they stood. Clothes slid over them slowly, garments in the colors that belonged to them. Standing for a moment in silence, dressed in black and greens, they pulled their human guises around them like cloaks. 

He held the door for her. And did so again, when they stepped outside on the streets. Cars swept by, their smokey exhausts irritating their eyes. They walked to the left, their shoulders touching now and then. 

“Kore… “ He pointed behind her where small plants followed the light steps of her feet. 

“That is up to you, my love.” She smiled encouragingly. He watched the plants and they turned to ash, leaving hardly a trace. 

He offered her his arm. “Shall we go home?” 

She took his arm with the confidence of a queen. “Yes… let’s.”

END


End file.
